Search results

It would be interesting to see one of those follow up programmes showing what happens to them 10 - 15 years on. Do they continue to perform well, of go off the rails ? Most of the tests are memory or arithmetic, but to me, genius is more about creativity - the ability to provide new insight or...

:lol: :lol: :roll: You must have a better class of builder round your way. Mind you, I don't fancy the job of telling the builder just how you think he should do it. Sure to get the job off to a great start !

When I visited the Reichstag building in Berlin, the audio guide delicately explained that the dome design by Foster and partners allowed energy to be recovered from the hot air rising from the parliament chamber below. We could heat much of London if we had a similar parliament building, I...

I think a fundamental characteristic of working with wood is that you are using a material that will always move, in a well understood way, and sucessful designs build on that understanding. Breadboard ends or cleats on the underside are usual ways of keeping a thin lid flat. Quarter sawn wood...

Isn't cement/vermiculite quite soft ? Might be soft enough to scrape away with a makeshift tool ?

No, other way around. Ammonium sulphate used as a fertiliser, Ammonium sulphamate broad spectrum herbicide (no longer approved in EU) and compost accelerator.

Ammonium sulphamate. Used to be sold as a herbicide, but is no longer approved for that use. But you can buy it / use it as a compost accelerator - which is what you want, I think. Any herbicide effects are just a bonus :wink: Attempts to burn it out will be difficult; it is dense old...

We used to have a complainy neighbour who had a noisy petrol mower. I would have taken up bee keeping if I had known :D

Something like this happened to me at the allotment, when I "found" a wasps' nest with a garden hoe. I was running around swatting at myself like a mad thing - they were in my hair, my shirt ... In the end I managed to fight them off with the hosepipe set in a wide spray, beat them back to the...

I was working on a worst case of someone sitting on the edge of the table. If you have better behaved dinner guests, then I guess shorter feet would suffice :)

Just to mildly disagree, if you went for 3 feet, that equation above would need the cos(36) replaced by cos(60). Where 5 feet at 550 mm long would be fairly stable, you'd need 3 at 900mm long for the same stability - i.e, right to the edge of the top. Or educate people not lean their butt on...

Can I chip in as an engineer ? If you look at the picture, 5th one down I think, underside view. Draw a line between the outer tips of an adjacent pair of feet. This is the line the table must pivot around to topple over. To topple right over, it would need the centre of gravity of the table...

Some time ago I had an old Mondeo, which had its rear plastic bumper cracked whilst parked. The culprit's insurers offered me about £650 to write it off. I called and asked if I could keep it, they said yes, but only ~£500 payout. But it did mean I had a driveable car to hunt for a...

Carbon is the most permanent/UV stable colouring for plastics. Sweep the chimney ?

... The Amazon Alexa, adding the id to the IoT The id acts according to the "pleasure principle"—the psychic force that motivates the tendency to seek immediate gratification of any impulse

If your topiary skills are as good as mine, what you intend to do will have little impact on the result ! Our garden had a box topiary bear peering out of the undergrowth. I tried to maintain it for a few years, but it ended up looking kind of simple - like something a child would draw. In...

A university friend of mine was taken to hospital after a painful collision whilst goal keeping at football. When the woman who took him (she was Finnish, in her defence) returned on her own to college, she announced "He's cracked his scrotum !" All men present winced for a while, until one...

I sourced several of mine from the Tools for self reliance stall at the Bodger's ball. Now, not suggesting you go to the ball, but I don't know if TFSR have a more regular outlet for surplus tools. As I suppose you might guess, older tools are often what gets donated, but the recipients are...

What doesn't kill you does you good :D

I think the oil is a good idea for end-grain boards. I have first hand experience of what happens to an end-grain carving board when you stick a hot, moist roast chicken (or whatever) on top of it for an hour or so. All that end grain drinks up the warm juices, the board bulges upward, and...